Lenovo Vibe Shot Is A Camera Guised As A Smartphone For $349

Quite surprisingly, Lenovo is rising as a smartphone company which can also make great cameraphones. Its Vibe Z2 Pro already has an impressive camera. Now Lenovo is taking another step forward or dare I say it’s leaping forward to make a crossover of smartphone and point and shoot cams. Lenovo is testing the waters with its first of its kind Vibe Shot.

Lenovo Vibe Shot looks like a traditional camera on the exterior. It has 16MP cam with OIS and six element lens. I assume it’s the same sensor found in Vibe Z2 Pro. It uses infrared for auto focus assist, tricolor flash for better color tone in images. The key difference between Vibe Z2 Pro and Vibe Shot is literally just a ‘key’. Vibe Shot has dedicated shutter key which should make overall experience better. But as a crossover device it doesn’t optical zoom or Xenon flash. Lenovo’s camera interface is already feature rich, as seen on Vibe Z2 Pro and Vibe Shot will also have the same and hopefully improved version of it. As a phone, it has specs lower than the Vibe Z2 Pro. Lenovo has chosen to with slightly lower Snapdragon 615 while still keeping the amount of RAM at 3GBs. Display too is down to but still commendable FullHD (1080p) unit unlike QuadHD on Vibe Z2 Pro. It carries dual SIM card slots and supports 4G LTE. In addition, it also packs microSD slot.

Looking at its photos, its design appears gentle and far more comfortable than Vibe Z2 Pro to me. It still uses premium aluminum construction. Addition of microSD slot is also a plus point. It’s going to be quite cheaper with price tag of just $349 and will be available from June. It looks like a well balanced product on literally every front. While other crossover devices from other OEMs have seen limited success, Asus’ Zenfone Zoom will be its primary competitor. But this is the first such attempt from Lenovo and if this one succeeds we might see even better smart camera from Lenovo in future.